Happy (belated) birthday, Hope!!!

I can't believe my sweet baby Hope is ONE! She is definitely a toddler--her new words today were "No" and "my" (mine). She had a good birthday celebration and birthday-day.

And a Hope funny: her favorite teacher at school, Ms. Amanda, straightened her hair today. Hope didn't recognize her and refused to go to her--it took 20 minutes of talking to her for Amanda to convince Hope it was her!

Henry's acrostic poem

Happy
Exprt at math
Nice
Runs fast
Yung

Harmony's book

My Hos (House)

by Harmony Taylor
Ilust (illustrated) by Harmony

My hos is kol and I Hav buk beds.
My Hos has pupkins. It has wicis and a cat and a pukin pi. The kis got to git the pukin ses uot.

The end.

Translation:

My house is cool and I have bunk beds.
My house has pumpkins. They have witches and a cat and a pumpkin pi (carved in them). The kids got to get the pumpkin seeds out.

The funny thing is that the teacher corrected the pumpkin pi to pie...but really I had carved a pumpkin with a pi symbol!

Happy Halloween!

The whole gang: The kitty bride Harmony, the kitty fairy bride Emi, Commander Cody Henry, Sam someone, Pumpkin Fairy Sarah and Dino-Hope!

Henry's creative writing assignment this week

The topic: Draw a picture of your family eating dinner. Then write a story about your family at dinnertime.

Henry's story:

I eat dinner with my family. On Tuesdays I only have 1 hour until I have to go to cub scouts. Most of the time (flip over to the other side) we have leftovers.

Mercifully, Mrs. F commented: Leftovers make a yummy second meal!

Me thinks I need to get back into the menu planning business...

Henry's Cub Scout Regatta race

He won the first round, but lost in the second...but managed to be a good sport about it :)

Hope walking

Hope started walking about a week ago, and she's getting pretty good!

Hope is WALKING!

Hope has had a busy week!

She claps and says "Babo!" ("Bravo"--one of the teachers in the baby room speaks only Spanish to them)
She waves and says "Hi" "Ello" or "Bubye" (often after the person isn't looking!)
She shakes her head and says "No, no, no, no"
She tries to stand up in her high chair
She stands near the CD player and bounces up and down

AND...

Friday night she took 4-5 steps several times! She walked some today too. She still prefers cruising or crawling when she's in a hurry, but it won't be long until she's walking as a sole means of transportation.

AND...

After being awake with her from 2-3 am and having not slept through the night myself more than twice in the last year, we moved Hope in with Harmony (who can sleep through anything. This meant bunking the twin beds, removing ALL the little piece toys (read: all of Henry's stuff) out of Harmony's room, and partially taking apart the crib to get it in...but we got it all done.

What a week! Here's hoping she does well in her new sleeping environment (and I do too!)

Wordless Wednesday

A girl after her great-great-great grandpa's heart (he was "The Potato King of the Northwest")

Adventures in Cub Scouts

Henry really wanted to join Cub Scouts (mostly because he heard there was archery involved). He's really enjoyed it so far! The first "big" activity was a rocket launch--the rockets were made out of two, 2L bottles. They were quite impressive--the winning hang times were 7+ seconds. When I get it to work, I'll post a video.

Henry learned to ride a bike!

In true Henry style, he's now a pro at riding without training wheels. Last weekend we ran into his friend, Sam, who was buying a new bike at the store because he had learned to ride without training wheels (and the old one was too small).

This was very motivating for Henry, though we had one small problem...his bike had disappeared. Luckily Sam loaned us his old one. Monday he went up and down our block a few times with Daddy, but last night he rode from our house to campus, then at least six laps around the track. Stopping is the only thing that's minorly challenging, but he was doing well by the end of the evening.

WTG Henry!

Creative treadmill use...

This link wasn't what I expected but it's way cool...

Hope's birth story

Hope was born on November 16, 2008 at 5:58 pm.

Hope was conceived after two miscarriages, several failed attempts at hiring a replacement for me at work, three trips to the hospital, and five days after my due date.

But even though November didn’t appear to be a good time to have a baby, it was perfect in God’s timing.

On November 6, I was watching our kids and four “extras” by myself. By the time the parents came home, we were making arrangements for Henry and Harmony to spend the night with the friends. But by 2 am, we were back home…while I was having contractions every 3 minutes, I wasn’t making “progress”, so they let me go home to sleep in my own bed. In the morning, the contractions were gone.

November 11 was my due date and my grandmother’s birthday. It would have been a great day to have a baby for many logistical and honoring reasons. I tried going for a long walk to encourage things. And while I did start having contractions and the OB sent me to the hospital (and the kids had another slumber party at a friends’ house), once again they went away. No Veteran’s day baby for us.

I was a very miserable, emotional time bomb for the remainder of the week. My mom came, hoping to meet a baby, but no dice. I may have even made another trip to the hospital on that Thursday, but same story. Every trip they offered to break my water in the morning, but considering I had ruptured waters with Henry for two days before being induced with Pitocin, I wasn’t very interested in that route.

Sunday morning I was having contractions—the first time I had them at the beginning of the day. My mom took the kids to church (their last time there), then to Chuck E. Cheese for lunch and playtime. Meanwhile, we walked around WalMart—I wanted to be completely, absolutely sure I’d deliver before going to the hospital. We saw several people we knew (You’re still pregnant?), bought a few things, and ate a final meal at Burger King.

When we got there around 2:30, the nurse-midwife was on duty and checked me. I was at 6 cm—no way I’m going home now! She checked me again at 4 and I was at 78cm…yes! Progress! It definitely got intense, and Patrick and I did “the labor dance” for a while. At 5:30 I was ready to push. Her chest was bigger than her head, so delivering her body was almost as intense as the head. The midwife did a great job making sure I didn't tear. She was born at 5:58 pm.

The midwife's comment was, "if your day job doesn't work out, you should teach the lamaze class"...somehow I doubt that, but I was glad that once everything FINALLY got going, she came quickly.

Patrick's parents got there about 30 minutes later, the kids and my mom 15 minutes after that. Since we knew they were coming, I got up when they took Hope to the nursery to weigh her (gone less than 5 minutes) so they could clean up the bed (and me a little). I was surprised by how badly I was shaking. With Henry I had an epidural and didn't get up for at least an hour, and with Harmony, I was in surgery right afterwards, so I guess I hadn't tried walking after the others!

We had a great hour or so with the kids and grandparents, meeting Hope. What a beautiful addition to our family!

Having Hope

One reason I went into labor multiple times before having Hope was that I was pretty much convinced that she would be stillborn. Despite no logical reason, I was convinced of this. Maybe it was the previous miscarriages, maybe it was the turmoil at church, but for whatever reason, I was pretty much expecting that Hope would be dead. (Even though we didn’t know the gender, I was pretty sure it was a girl.)

But Hope wasn’t dead. She completely lives up to her name, and daily reminds me of the passage she was named from, Romans 5:3-5:

Not only so, but we also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us.

It totally hit me this weekend how perfect God’s timing is. I definitely had my plans – “wouldn’t the fall of 2007 be nice? I’ll be on leave!” was cancelled via miscarriage. My plan for my grandmother’s birthday on Nov 11 didn’t work either, despite my attempts to “walk” the baby out.

In both cases, God needed me to be broken so I could fully appreciate the gift I was getting. I don’t think I would have treasured the third (or my first or second) baby had I not had the miscarriages. I wouldn’t have gotten the “pre-requisites” for hope—perseverance and character—had I not had all the prior labor. And her birth in the midst of turmoil and stress over church drama reminds me that really, God IS in all of the messiness of life. His timing IS perfect, even when it’s not mine.

So Hope was born, both literally and figuratively. And she continues to grow and bring joy daily, if not moment by moment.

Harmony's weekend report

This weekend was a busy one. Friday I picked up Henry, Harmony and Emi from school, then our friends Emma, Ruthie, Olivia, and Sarah joined us (Henry escaped for a boy playdate). The girls played, made pizza, and watched a movie.

Saturday we did chores (folding a mountain of laundry) then celebrated Samuel's birthday (Happy Birthday, big guy!). The kids went to a movie with friends and hung out at their house while Patrick and I had some adults over for a project Patrick's working on.

Sunday, we went to the donut shop and "home schooled" for church (Patrick played the keyboard for worship, Henry read, and we discussed it). After lunch, the kids and I met a friend at the ice cream store and played at the playground. We ended up eating dinner at Little Mexico.

So what did Harmony write about in her weekend report? The pajama party? The movie? The birthday party? Ice cream at the park?

"I stad hom" (translation: I stayed home). Maybe its what she wishes happened...

Happy Birthday, Henry!

Today was Henry's 7th birthday and the first day of school! We had to run to the bus, but made it...



I brought snack for Henry's class--ice cream bars. I'm amazed at the difference between kindergarten and first grade--Henry came home with an assignment book; they have homework every day!

After school the kids took the bus to their "normal" destination. They had a mini-party for Henry there and played on the playground while I picked up our CSA veggies (yummy!). Then we went to Henry's requested dinner...the mouse house, Chuck E. Cheese! We met some friends there and had a pleasant time.




Happy Birthday, Henry! What a great boy you've become!

The Queen of Bumps, Bruises and Grapes (er, Scrapes)

That was Harmony's self proclaimed titles last year. This year she's just "The Queen" in her mind... Tomorrow The Queen starts Kindergarten. Where did time go?

Party Planning

Henry's birthday is on Wednesday--the first day of school (what timing!) Since I was out of town this weekend (Hope and I went to Colorado for a conference), his party will be next weekend. He wants a military theme, and this is what I have so far:

Enroll into a division (Marines or Airforce)
Basic Training (push ups, jumping jacks)
Sargeant Says (Patrick will be the sargeant)
Hike to campus (one block away--we'll get another dad to help)
Capture the Flag game
Hike back to the "mess hall" for lunch, birthday cake and gifts
Make paper airplanes with special airplane paper
Land airplanes in enemy territory (a hula hoop)
Obstacle course
Water grenade fight

Food will be:
hot dogs and fixings
carrots
watermelon or grapes
birthday cake :) (9x13 with crushed graham crackers to be sand with clean army guys on top)

Is it ok to do two rounds of games? The party is from 10:30 to 1, so I'm figuring the first round of games will be 10:30-11:30, food from 11:30 to 12:15 and round two of games from then until the end.

I'm a little stumped on favors. I think this will be the last co-ed party; we're inviting 14. I think I'll make dog tags...other suggestions?

Six year old narcissism...

Me: Henry, do you know what day today is?
Henry: Saturday.
Me: Do you know what else today is?
Henry: No.
Me: It's my birthday!
Henry: Oh good! That means it's only 12 days until my birthday!

Update

Sorry I haven't posted much...guess I don't have much to say. We've been busy and having fun. My camera is in the diaper bag, which is at my sister-in-law's house, so no pics for a while...and I got a new laptop, so I'm still figuring everything out.

Hope is crawling all over the place, and pulling up on anything she can reach. She's sporting two tiny teeth on the bottom, and making lots of fun sounds--she's added raspberries, pppfffts, and fish lips to her ba-ba-ba-ma-ma-ma's. She has a re-check on her ear tubes (that she got three weeks ago) on Wednesday.

We've had a fun long weekend. Thursday evening we went hiking, and were stalked by four raccoons while we ate our picnic dinner. One of the water fountains shot the water at least six feet--Harmony held the button while Henry and some other boys tried to catch it with their mouths (and got thoroughly soaked). Henry also fell in a small stream, so he took off everything except his underwear for the ride home. No stopping for ice cream! Though we did stop at an Amish farm and get some green beans.

Friday we went to Conner Prairie with some friends we met on the train. They have two girls, one Harmony's age and one Henry's age. When we got to Conner Prairie, I told Henry that next time we should bring his friends, Jacob and Aden...and about five minutes later, we ran into them! Henry hung out with them for the rest of the afternoon. We met back at the ice cream stand, and ran into some of Patrick's relatives--definitely a small world!

Saturday we celebrated Ava's (our niece) first birthday. She and Hope were very cute, checking each other out. It was also the first time cousin Emma and Harmony could really play together on their own--soo cute! Fireworks got rained out...

Sunday we homeschooled for church on generosity, ran some errands, and played at a friend's house, then celebrated Ruthie's birthday. How big you all are getting!

So that's the news from here. I'm taking the kids on the train to see my parents (20 hours on a train, anyone?), and I doubt I'll have internet access up there, so it'll be quiet around here for a while. Hope you're having a great summer (if anyone actually reads this...I'm writing more for myself and the kids' journals at this point...)